Toronto, Ontario’s largest city and Canada’s most populous metropolis is still several months away from holding its election, but this early online gambling site Bodog is offering betting odds on who would win as mayor. Although many are placing their hopes on Olivia Chow as the candidate likely to succeed in dislodging incumbent mayor Rob Ford, many are placing their bets that Ford will win come Election Day on October 27, 2014.

In response to an email interview as to why Bodog Canada is venturing into a non-traditional political gambling and why Toronto’s mayoral election for that matter, Bodog Canada’s sportsbook manager Adam Burns acknowledged that it is indeed a first for the online gambling site. Accordingly, part of it is because of the increasing demand for this type of gambling; but the main reason, says Burns, is Rob Ford.

The sportsbook manager did not have to elaborate much further, because despite Olivia Chow’s strong showing at the polls, there is still a great deal of chance that Rob Ford could still pull off his re-election bid. This is despite the scandal created by the video clips turned over to the Globe and Mail by a self-confessed drug dealer, which showed Ford smoking crack cocaine.

Although the mayor later confirmed the contents of the video clip as true, he asserted that it was only because he was in a “drunken stupor”. After which, the crack-smoking incumbent mayor of Toronto took a leave of absence from his office and from his campaign activities, to enter rehabilitation in order to address what he asserts as his “issues with alcohol”.

Adam Burns says that they have seen money coming in for Olivia Chow; but so far, most of the bets placed are for Rob Ford. Chow is the odds-on favorites but there are those who believe that the odds could still tilt in favor of Rob Ford because the Anti-Ford votes will be distributed among four candidates running against him.

Many of the city’s political observers believe that this is exactly what Rob Ford wants. After all, Chow does not have the full support of the Anti-Ford voters, seeing that she also has a lot of detractors. Since there are other credible candidates in the running, namely: TTC chair Karen Stintz, David Soknacki and John Tory, the votes needed in frustrating Rob Ford’s re-election bid will be splintered instead of being placed as solid votes to support a single candidate.

Toronto’s mayoral race could become even more crowded if city councilors Adam Vaughan, Shelley Carroll and Denzil Minnan-Wong decide to push through with their own bids to wrest the mayoral seat away from the beleaguered Ford. Betting on who will become the next mayor will also get even more interesting, since every potential vote taken away from odds-on favorite Olivia Chow, will bring greater chances of winning to those who placed their bets on Ford.

As of this writing, Bodog’s payouts for every CA$100 bet placed on the five current mayoral candidates are: Chow at CA$130, Ford at CA$300, Soknacki at CA$1,500, Stinz at CA$1,000 and Tory at CA$175.